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Removable Rear X-Brace

05-12-2009, 12:34 PM

I’m in the process of adding an ‘X’ brace to my chassis. One half of the ‘X’ over the motor the other half in the halo bar. With that I need to install a removable ‘V’ brace in the chassis over the rear mounted motor. The other ‘V’ in the halo will be fixed. I think you’ll get the idea with this picture.

That said, I’m looking for the best way to build the removable ‘V’ over the motor. I’ve been looking a Tubing Couplers like these which seem like they might just do the trick,,,, but though I’d see if you guys have any better ideas.

The first question I have to ask is this car for street or competition? If it is for competition then check with your sanctioning body. There are many ways to create a removable brace. One is to simply slide a larger tube over the smaller tube at each end, thru drill them and bolt them in place. Some others are shown in the SCCA's 2009 GCR. If you google 2009 GCR it will take you to the web page where you can download it. It is a PDF file so you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Comment

And thats an LS6 (aluminum C5 Corvette motor) with what looks like a Porsche trans axle.

Either way, its gonna run like a scalded dog when its done.

Not so sure that I would run those tubing couplers...but thats my personal preference...I'd say a heim joint would do everything you need it to. You'd also have a double shear on the bolt, which could be say...a 3/4" grade 8 if you wanted it to be.

Like SCCATECH said though, if its ever gonna run competition, look in the rule book and see what you have to do.

Comment

I'm building a VW pan based car. The cage is welded to plates on the rocker sills and also bolts to the pan. This allows the body to be seperated from the pan. For my seat bars, I welded from the sill bar to the pan (same with the diagonals from the seat belt bar to the tunnel) and used a coupler like this

These are not the exact ones I got, but gives you the idea. My are for 1.75", but turned down to have the "neck" for 1.625x.134 tubing. They work good.